Monthly Archives: March 2009

The Jerai Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) division was dissolved today after more than 500 of its members, including its head, B.Kalaivanar, resigned.
Kalaivanar said they had lost confidence in the party leadership.

Kalaivanar, who was also the Kedah PKR Indian Community Development Committee chairman, said all the members who resigned would campaign for non-PKR candidates in the Selambau state by-election.

The by-election on April 7 will see a three-way fight among PKR’s S.Manikumar, the Barisan Nasional’s Datuk S.Ganesan and 13 independent candidates.

Due to climate chaos wreaking havoc to Santa’s North Pole winter detection system, he has mistakenly set out to balmy Asia way ahead of schedule.

Having been tipped off, my contact in Sarawak has been keeping an eye out for his early arrival. Hark, are those sleigh bells ringing? The ring-a-ling draws closer and then… with a mighty flourish, the sleigh draws into view and screeches to a halt. As the jolly White-Haired One, a huge sack of goodies slung over his shoulder, disembarks and bellows, “Ho! Ho! Ho!”, his band of cronies… er, I mean, faithful elves dances a jig.

It’s Santa and his elves bringing the politics of ‘instant noodles’ development to the good folks of Batang Ai.

…Sarawak is conducting a census among people in the Batang Ai resettlement area to resolve the long-standing issue of land titles after they were displaced by the construction of the Batang Ai hydro-electric dam in 1982…(NST, 27 March 09)

…According to Jabu, Batang Ai can look forward to several projects soon and these include building of new roads and upgrading of present roads which are estimated to cost in the region of RM12 million…

…These projects which include the RM5 million Batang Ai ring road, the resettlement road and the RM4 million Lubok Antu-Nanga Bulu road would be implemented under the second stimulus package announced recently by Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak, he added…

…Later, another ceremony to hand over cash rebates took place at Serubah, Lemanak which was also officiated by Jabu and attended by Masing. They also took the opportunity to introduce Mussen to the people there…

…In Serubah, 177 people received cash rebates totalling RM87,000…

…In total, there were 869 recipients and RM430,000 in total cash rebates were paid out in Lubok Antu, which was the first area in the state to receive this assistance….

Sarawak’s Batang Ai state seat by-election will see a straight fight between the Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) and Barisan Nasional. Former five-term MP for Lubok Antu, Jawah Gerang, of PKR is to face BN candidate Malcolm Mussen .

Johnny Chuat, an Iban blogger and publisher of an Iban magazine, who entererd the nomination centre at about 9am failed to submit his papers as an independent.

Coming out of the centre, he wore a PKR shirt and met his supporters, telling them to support Jawah Gerang.

There were some tense moments when objections were raised against the two candidates, but the returning officer, Nelson Mujah Girie overruled the objections and accepted both nominations.

The returning officer made the announcement at 11.30am.

The large crowd estimated at 10,000 exchanged friendly taunting, but there were a few tense moments among the PKR supporters when the police started to seize PAS flags.

PKR Dominique Ng intervened and talked to a senior police officer. Later Ng told Malaysiakini that the police refused to allow PAS flags to be displayed at the field among the DAP and PKR crowd.

‘Dayakism in action’

The police told Ng that PAS was not a participating party in the by-election and according to the rules of the Election Commission, any party which was not involved should not be allowed to join the crowd displaying its flags.

Ng told the police that if that was the case, then SUPP, SPDP and PBB should also not be allowed to display their flags. But the police replied that they were parties in the Barisan Nasional, whereas Pakatan Rakyat (PR) was not a registerd body.

After a long argument, the police allowed the PAS contingent to join its partners, saying that it was all a miscommunication.

A former senior BN leader commented on the number of so many Dayak lawyers present at the nomination centre to support the PKR…it shows “Dayakism in action”.

Many ordinary Dayaks from professionals down to rural dwellers have taken a greater interest in the Dayaks’ political predicament while using PKR as the main vehicle to articulate their fears and hopes.

SUNGAI PETANI, March 29 – Just imagine, 15 candidates for one by-election. It’s unprecedented and the presence of the 13 independent candidates for the Bukit Selambau by-election weighs heavy on the minds of both the Pakatan Rakyat (PR) and the Barisan Nasional (BN).

The record number of candidates – and the fact that many of them are disgruntled PKR members, both past and present – has brought a different dimension to the contest for the Kedah state seat.

However, PR leaders are confident that they hold a large enough lead on the ground to mathematically overcome whatever votes these independents may “steal.”

“Even if each candidate takes 100 votes, based on our 2,362-vote majority last year, we will still win. That is the formula,” Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Azizan Abdul Razak told The Malaysian Insider.

PR’s election director Azmin Ali added that voters would not back the independent candidates as those in rural areas have “been marginalised for the past 50 years, so they now need a strong leader.”

The PKR vice president added that if S. Manikumar wins, he would sit on the executive council by virtue of the fact that the previous incumbent V Arumugam vacated the post reserved for an Indian PKR assemblyman.

“So the people of Bukit Selambau will vote for him, as he can bring direct development to the area,” Azmin said.

But MCA deputy president Datuk Seri Chua Soi Lek said that the high number of independent candidates would affect PKR adversely, although BN will also have to struggle with anti-MIC sentiments among the Indian community.

“Most of the independent candidates are disgruntled PKR men who are unhappy with their candidate,” echoed MIC president Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu.

He added that Indians here were “overwhelmingly happy” with Datuk S. Ganesan, an MIC central working committee member, citing the support he received when he attended a function last night attended by 1,200 Indians.

However, eyewitness reports said that Samy Vellu was forced to leave the event after 10 minutes because he was booed aggressively by the crowd.

Judging by the head count of supporters, Azmin would seem to have a case, as the 5,000-strong group accompanied by a lion dance troupe waving PKR, Pas and DAP flags cheered boisterously for “Reformasi!”

Barisan Nasional’s 2,000-strong camp was dominated by the baju kurung of Wanita Umno and supported by Malay percussion instruments.

Deputy Election Commission chairman Datuk Wan Ahmad Wan Omar pointed out to police that using musical instruments on nomination day was an election offence and requested that they “advise the supporters to stop” but the supporters kept banging on.

PR supporters engaged in a battle to see who could be louder not with their BN counterparts, but with a police helicopter which whirled incessantly overhead.

The only undesirable incident was when Samy got caught up in a war of words with some PKR supporters, but police quickly moved in to break up the situation.

With over 100 riot police supported by FRU personnel, supporters did well to keep within their allotted areas.

BN election director for Bukit Selambau Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein was visited by Azmin at the BN tent and both agreed to a clean and fair campaign.

“No provocation and no violence,” they said and shook on the deal with Wanita Umno chief Datuk Seri Shahrizat Jalil, MCA vice president Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai and Pas information chief Mahfuz Omar as witnesses.

The first to arrive this morning was Husaini Yaacob, who was bright and early at 7am. By the time nominations began at 9am, 10 independents and Manikumar were in the centre, but Ganesan was still waiting with the BN ranks for Samy Vellu and Hishammuddin to arrive.

The 10 independents included Radzi Md Lazim, a last-minute candidate who said he was a PKR Baling division chief up to 2007, turning the 14-way fight into a 15-way contest.

But Ganesan and the three independents all managed to show up by 9.45am, 15 minutes before nominations closed.

It included A. Jayagopal, whose PKR membership was suspended when he declared that he would contest Bukit Selambau.

He arrived and spoke to reporters in English, Hokkien and Tamil and even sang in Mandarin.

“I am very close to MB Azizan but I do not want an exco post. I just want to help the poor people who do not even have clean drinking water,” he said before going on with more details about himself to the point that reporters told him to hurry into the nomination centre.

At noon, returning officer Datuk Abdullah Mat Akhir announced that nine objections were received and rejected, confirming that 15 candidates would take part in the historic by-election.

While Manikumar will run under the PKR flag, and Ganesan the BN scales, the other 13 selected various logos such as a rooster, an alarm clock, an aeroplane and a fish.

The battle for the April 7 polls is expected to be fierce, with more than just a state seat at stake.

It is seen as a referendum on the relevance of MIC and forms part of a triple header that will reflect the acceptance of Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s newly-minted leadership of BN.

It will also see how the rakyat is responding to the PR administration in Kedah with a series of recent scandals afflicting the coalition’s state governments in Penang, Perak, Selangor and also here in Kedah.

PR look set to ignore a ban on open-air ceramahs reportedly issued by state police with Azizan saying that “the only black and white on that is the newsprint from the media reports.”

BN, on the other hand, is riding on the new leadership of Umno. Vice president Hishammuddin said that “the process of returning support to BN has already begun with the new Umno line-up.”